add clothing physics to a PART of mesh?
You have to create a vertex group.

There is a video tutorial on making a flag by BornCG ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOtRsHYCzEE&amp;list=PL006307E237BB7FF6&amp;index=21 ) that shows you pretty well how to do this.

Essentially, you add the physics to the entire mesh, then select a vertex group to ignore the physics and remain stationary.

My knowledge in blender is only a few months old so please excuse if this does not solve your problem.